Fine gauge tufting machines

ABSTRACT

This disclosure relates to fine gauge tufting machines and in particular to improvements in the gauge parts thereof. A tufting machine looper construction is disclosed which permits the elimination of one-half the number of loopers normally used by providing a double hook construction on the looper for use with two needles while requiring the space for only one looper.

United States Patent 11 1 Collier et a1,

4 1 Apr. 22, 1975 1 FlNlI GAUGE TUFTKNG MACHINES [75] lnventors: JamesR. Collier; Randel R. Smith,

both of Chattanooga, Tenn.

[73] Assignee: The Singer Company, New York,

[22] Filed: Jan. 7, 1974 [21] Appl. No.: 431,518

Related U.S. Application Data [63] Continuation of Scr. No. 232,836,March 8, 1972,

abandoned.

[52] US. Cl 112/79 R [51] lm. Cl. D051: 15/22 [58] Field of Search112/79 R, 79 A [56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 3,121,4132/1964 Sigoda 112/162X 3,192,887 7/1965 Perl 112/162 3,402,686 9/1968Rodstein et a1. 1 12/79 R 3,595,184 7/1971 Watkins 112/79 R 3,635,1779/1970 Gable et a1 112/79 R 3,780,678 12/1973 Short 112/79 A PrimaryE.\'aminer-Werner H. Schroeder Attorney, Agent, or Firm-Chester A.Williams, Jr.; Marshall .1. Breen; Alan Ruderman [57] ABSTRACT Thisdisclosure relates to fine gauge tufting machines and in particular toimprovements in the gauge parts thereof. A tufting machine looperconstruction is disclosed which permits the elimination of one-half thenumber of loopers normally used by providing a double hook constructionon the looper for use with two needles while requiring the space foronly one looper.

5 Claims, 3 Drawing Figures FllNE GAUGE TUFTING MACHINES This is acontinuation of application Ser. No. 232.836. filed Mar. 8. I972. nowabandoned.

GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The trend in the tufting industrytoday is toward finer gauge machines or machines wherein the rows oftufted loops are spaced closer together. As the gauges of the parts orthe space therebetween decreases, problems arise because of spacing andsupporting the gauge parts. For example. the loopers in a tuftingmachine are each usually supported in a groove in a looper block andsecured therein by a set screw or similar means. In a broadlooam tuftingmachine there may be substantially in excess of 1.000 loopers supportedin this manner in the block. As the loopers are spaced closer and closertogether for finer gauge tufting. as for example one-twentieth or onetwenty-fifth gauge. the loopers must necessarily be moved closertogether. This results in less supporting material in the block beingleft between the loopers and less room is left for the set screw or thelike for holding the looper in the block. As will be appreciated.eventually one comes to a point where there is not enough material leftin the block to properly support the loopers or to maintain them in afixed relationship with their associated needles.

It is a prime purpose of the present invention to provide a novel gaugepart construction for fine gauge tufting machines wherein one-half ofloopers usually required for the particular gauge machine may beeliminated thus permitting the loopers to be spaced at substantiallytwice the spacing of that which would usually have been required. Ingeneral a novel looper construction is provided wherein each looper isconstructed with two bill portions. each said bill portion being oriented to cooperate with one tufting needle. Thus each looper willserveto pick up loops from two adjacent tufting needles. Because of the novellooper construction. the needles may be spaced closer together toprovide fine gauges. say one-twentieth or one twenty-fifth gauge. whilestill being able to properly locate and support the cooperating loopers.

Accordingly. it is one object of the invention to provide a novel andimproved fine gauge tufting machine.

It is another object of the invention to provide a novel and improvedfine gauge tufting machine including a novel looper construction.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION Referring to the drawings. in FIG.1 there is shown a cross sectional view of a tufting machine including ahead portion containing the drive mechanism (not shown), a push rod 12suitably reciprocated in an endwise relationship by the drive mechanismand a needle bar I4 attached to the push rod I2 for reciprocating thetufting needles 16 for endwise penetration through the backing fabric F.The backing fabric F may be fed across the tufting machine bed plate 18by suitable rolls 20. 22. 24 and 26. Presser feet 28 and 30 are alsoprovided to keep the fabric flat on the bed plate 18 during the returnstroke of the needles l6. Yarn jerkers 32 and 34 are supported by theneedle bar 14 and have yarn ends Y and Y" threaded tlherethrough whichyarn jerkers serve to take up the slack and even up the height of theloops during the return stroke of the needles.

Supported below the bed plate 18 is a rock shaft 36 which is driven inan oscillating manner from the main drive mechanism in a known manner. Alooper block support 38 is bolted to the shaft 36 for movement therewithand carries a looper block 40 thereon which in turn has loopers 42mounted in slots 44 therein. The loopers are stationarily secured in theslots 44 by set screws 46 shown in phantom in FIG. 1. In operation thebacking fabric F is fed across the machine in the direction of the arrowshown in FIG. 1 and the needles I6 are reciprocated to penetrate thebacking fabric with loops of yarn. As the needles proceed through theirdownstroke the loopers are rocked into position for intercepting a legof the yarn from the needles (FIGS. 2 & 3) and hold the yarn during thereturn or upstroke of the needles. The loopers are then rocked back andthe loops are then removed from the loopers as the fabric is fed and apile surface is thus formed on the face of the backing fabric. Such aprocess as heretofore described is well known in the art.

As briefly described above. it is desirable to provide finer gaugefabrics such as one-twentieth or one twenty-fifth gauge. This means thatthe needles and loopers must be spaced closer together so that theresultant rows of tufts formed thereby will be closer together. As theneedles and loopers are brought closer together for finer gauge tufting.the problems of providing adequate support and spacing for the needlesand loopers increases. It is known that the needles may be staggered.that is. to provide more than one row of needles with the needles ofeach row being disposed between adjacent pairs of needles of the otherrow. The needles of each row are thus spaced in both the lateral andlongitudinal direction. This permits closer rows of tufts to be producedwhile still being able to thread the needles and replace them etc.

However. such is not the case with the loopers since each looper mustcooperate with an associated needle and its position and location istherefore determined in part by its associated needle. Although theloopers may be staggered as are the needles. substantially the sameamount of space is required in the looper bar for the looper grooves andfurther each looper must be provided with a means for securing it in thelooper bar. This has become increasingly more difficult as the gaugesare reduced. Also the loopers must operate without interfering with oneanother in cooperating with their respective needles. So it can be seenthat. as the gauges become finer. the problems become greater insofar asthe loops are concerned.

The present invention provides a means for overcoming one of theproblems arising in fine gauge tufting. in particular the looper problemdiscussed above. Referring again to the drawings. it will be seen thattwo rows of needles l6 and 16 are provided with the rows being paralleland spaced from one another. Further the needies of row R6 are laterallydisposed so that each needle 16 lies between two needles 16'. This iswhat is termed in the art as staggering the needles and allows for therows of tuft to be formed by the needles to be spaced closer together.The loopers 42 are disposed in the looper bar 40 and are constructedsuch that a looper bill will cooperate with each needle. As shown. eachlooper 42 is provided with a shank portion 46 which forms the main bodyof the looper. the lower portion thereof being supported in the slot 44.A protrusion of lug portion 48 is also provided to aid in positioningand holding the looper in the looper bar 40. The looper 42 is furtherprovided with two bill portions 50 and 52 which are substantiallyupright with respect to the shank portion 46 and include hook-likeportions 54 and 56, respectively, at its outer end and throat portions58 and 60 being formed between the upright portions and the hook-likeportions of the looper. As the yarn is deposited on the looper it isgrasped by a hook-like end of the bill and will be held in the throatportion thereof until removal.

In FIG. 2 it will be seen that the bills 50 and 52 are spaced from oneanother in the longitudinal direction or from front to rear and the bill50 is offset in a lateral direction with respect to the bill 52 andshank portion 46. The bills 50 and 52 are formed such that for eachlooper 42 there will be a hook bill 50 and 54 for coopcrating with aneedle in each of the rows 16 and 16. As viewed in FIG. 2 the bill 52 isshown as cooperating with a needle 16 while at the same time the bill 50is cooperating with a needle 16. Thus each looper 42 cooperates with twoneedles at the same time and thereby makes it necessary to use onlyone-half as many loopers. Therefore. for example. in a machine havingsay L000 needles in a staggered relationship. there will be one 500loopers caching having a bill 52 cooperating with each needle in a rowof needles l6 and a bill 50 cooperating with each needle in a row ofneedles 16.

From the above description it will be apparent that a novel mechanism isprovided for use in fine gauge tufting and which makes it possible toovercome a significant problem in construction of tufting machines foruse in fine gauge tufting. The invention is simple in construction andalso enables those operating such machines to repair them without anymore difficulty than in repairing wider gauge tufting machines alreadyin use.

While the invention has been described in its preferred embodiment. itwill be obvious to those skilled in the art that various changes andmodifications may be made without departing from the spirit and scopethereof as defined in the appended claims.

What is claimed is:

l. A single piece looper for a tufting machine includ ing a shankportion for supporting said looper in a slot,

in a looper bar. at least two separate looper bills integral with andextending outwardly from said shank portion, said looper bills beingspaced apart in the direction of the slot and disposed in spaced planesgenerally parallel to said shank portion such that each said looper billis disposed for cooperation with yarn carrying needles spaced apart inthe direction of the slot and dis posed in spaced planes generallyparallel to said looper shank portion for seizing a loop of yarntherefrom to form a pair of tufts.

2. A looper as recited in claim 1 wherein at least one of said billsincludes a portion which extends between and intersects said spacedplanes.

3. A looper as recited in claim 2 in which at lesat one of said bills ispositioned in a common plane with said shank portion. 1

4. In a tufting machine. a plurality of laterally extending rows ofclosely spaced needles. said rows being substantially parallel with theneedles of each row being laterally offset with respect to the needlesof each other row. means for feeding a backing fabric across the tuftingmachine in a transverse direction relative to the rows of needles, meansfor reciprocating said needles in an endwise relationship forpenetrating said backing fabric with loops of yarn, looper means forseizing a loop of yarn from each needle and for holding the loop of yarnduring the return stroke of said needles. said looper means including alooper bar supported for reciprocating movement in timed relationshipwith each penetration of said needles. said looper bar having aplurality of spaced slots. a looper having a shank mounted in each saidslot. each said looper comprising an integral unit having a plurality oftransversely spaced looper bills with each bill of each looper beinglaterally offset with respect to the other bills. the bills of eachlooper being disposed for cooperation with a needle in a different rowduring each penetration thereof.

5. In a tufting machine. at least two laterally extending rows ofclosely spaced needles. said rows being substantially parallel with theneedles of each row being laterally offset with respect to the needlesof each other row. means for feeding a backing fabric across the tuftingmachine in a transverse direction relative to the rows of needles. meansfor reciprocating said needles in an endwise relationship forpenetrating said backing fabric with loops of yarn. looper means forseizing a loop of yarn from each needle and for holding the loop of yarnduring the return stroke of said needles, said looper means including alooper bar supported for reciprocating movement in timed relationshipwith each penetration of said needles. said looper bar having aplurality of spaced slots. a looper having a shank mounted in each saidslot. each said looper comprising an integral unit having at least twotransversely spaced looper bills. at least one bill including a portiondeflected out of the plane of the shank into a plane parallel to andspaced therefromsuch that said bill is laterally offset with respect tothe other bills. the bills of each looper being disposed for cooperationwith a needle in a different row during each penetration thereof. l =i=

1. A single piece looper for a tufting machine including a shank portionfor supporting said looper in a slot in a looper bar, at least twoseparate looper bills integral with and extending outwardly from saidshank portion, said looper bills being spaced apart in the direction ofthe slot and disposed in spaced planes generally parallel to said shankportion such that each said looper bill is disposed for cooperation withyarn carrying needles spaced apart in the direction of the slot anddisposed in spaced planes generally parallel to said looper shankportion for seizing a loop of yarn therefrom to form a pair of tufts. 1.A single piece looper for a tufting machine including a shank portionfor supporting said looper in a slot in a looper bar, at least twoseparate looper bills integral with and extending outwardly from saidshank portion, said looper bills being spaced apart in the direction ofthe slot and disposed in spaced planes generally parallel to said shankportion such that each said looper bill is disposed for cooperation withyarn carrying needles spaced apart in the direction of the slot anddisposed in spaced planes generally parallel to said looper shankportion for seizing a loop of yarn therefrom to form a pair of tufts. 2.A looper as recited in claim 1 wherein at least one of said billsincludes a portion which extends between and intersects said spacedplanes.
 3. A looper as recited in claim 2 in which at lesat one of saidbills is positioned in a common plane with said shank portion.
 4. In atufting machine, a plurality of laterally extending rows of closelyspaced needles, said rows being substantially parallel with the needlesof each row being laterally offset with respect to the needles of eachother row, means for feeding a backing fabric across the tufting machinein a transverse direction relative to the rows of needles, means forreciprocating said needles in an endwise relationship for penetratinGsaid backing fabric with loops of yarn, looper means for seizing a loopof yarn from each needle and for holding the loop of yarn during thereturn stroke of said needles, said looper means including a looper barsupported for reciprocating movement in timed relationship with eachpenetration of said needles, said looper bar having a plurality ofspaced slots, a looper having a shank mounted in each said slot, eachsaid looper comprising an integral unit having a plurality oftransversely spaced looper bills with each bill of each looper beinglaterally offset with respect to the other bills, the bills of eachlooper being disposed for cooperation with a needle in a different rowduring each penetration thereof.